Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

Education and education policy are important for our national life. They prepare the citizens to perform civic duties and accomplish the national goals. The national or federal education policy regulates the education system in a country, i.e. teaching, curriculum, assessment, etc. through a set of rules and regulations. The formulation and implementation of the education policy, likewise any other national policy, involve different policy actors, i.e. political leaders, administration, and the education professionals. Among these policy actors, the political elites or politically powerful people have large influence of their political ideologies in the process of policy making and implementation in different level of administration. The political parties in developing countries may focus on increasing literacy rate or providing basic education to the population, and the developed countries with good literacy rate may focus on enhancing technological innovation or research activities, or social equity in the country. This study aims to illustrate the extent of projection of political ideologies in the national education policies in Bangladesh and the USA. The scope of the study is limited to the national education policies in K-12 level in these two countries. This study covers the national education policies in Bangladesh since the liberation war in 1971, and in the USA after the World War II to understand the trend of national education policies during post-war situation and their impacts on the society. This study is a qualitative research where the researcher has used the content analysis method for data collection and analysis. After analyzing the data, the researcher finds that the education policies in Bangladesh emphasizes on determining the national identity and values since the liberation war. However, the values vary in different political regimes which is reflected in the textbooks and the national curriculum as well. Besides, the change in the political power also makes changes in every level of administration along with the process of policy formulation and implementation that cost ample amount of money and time. The overview of the influence of political ideologies in the USA indicates that trend of the federal education policies in the USA focuses on different aspects of social issues to help the citizens receiving the knowledge and developing skills to improve their own life with better living and with good human values, and reduce social discrimination in the society. However, the change in the political power affects the amount of budget allocation of education sector in different levels of administration. In the conclusion, the researcher proposes some recommendations for further improvement of the national education policies and their implementation process, i.e. emphasizing on people's needs instead of party agenda, encouraging involvement of other policy actors along with political groups in policy making process, increasing budget allocation in education sector and improving the quality of education and skills of educators, etc.

Keywords: education policy, political ideology, political regime, social impact